Rashel and Quinn x
by xxpinknikkixx123
Summary: Rashel is training at the Gym in Thierry's Mansion, relatively short but sweet, hope you like it x


Rashel had been studying different forms of martial arts for as long as she could remember. Every night she would go through the motions of a different style whether it was jujitsu or karate or even aikido. She promised herself that she would master all of them; then again she had no choice in the matter. As a vampire hunter, as the cat, it was her job to stay alive.

The gym was empty at the moment, aside from one of Thierry's cleaners who was wiping down a sweaty press-up bench in the corner, but Rashel's mind was swarming with information. Every tiny sound was registered, from the sound of the creaking punching bag, which she was kicking ferociously, to the footsteps from the floor above. Nothing escaped Rashel when she had _Zanshin, _the awareness of everything while focusing on nothing.

Rashel was trying to perfect her roundhouse kick but she was having difficulty. Martial arts were beautiful to her, they sang out to her like no music ever could yet at her level they still weren't effective enough. A true master of martial arts would flow with speed and accuracy to a point where they were deadly, but they weren't facing vampires who could intercept Rashel's axe kick and twist the knee joint until her calf snapped in two, in under a second.

Rashel lashed out again. Her foot smashed into the bag so hard that she had to dodge the bag as it swung back at her but it still wasn't good enough.

She was still too slow.

She slammed the punch bag with both her fists, furious with herself. She had become soft. What was she doing?

She swore in anger.

It was hard enough regaining _Zanshin_ when she lost it but now she was losing her edge. What had happened to her? Why couldn't she do it? …It was his fault, said a small voice at the back of her head. It was all him!

Ever since she met John Quinn, she had been thrown off track. From the moment she realised she couldn't kill him everything slipped away from her. The memory of the enclave was still as vivid as ever, she had nearly died several times because of him, because she lost control. She seethed, how could one person do this to her, why did she have to have met him?

Suddenly she was brought back to the present by the knife at her throat, a hard green wooden knife, the one that had been in her back pocket. Her knife.

Damn it.

'Is that really what you think…?' Said an empty voice from behind her.

John immediately released her so that she could turn around and face him. Rashel could see beneath his dark hair the darkness in her soulmate's eyes, the icy glacier that he hid behind.

'Do you really wish that you'd never met me?' He continued. This time his voice wasn't empty, this time Rashel could hear the hurt and rejection that she had caused. She immediately became defensive.

'Of course not!' She snapped, still angry over letting him surprise her, becoming ever more frustrated as the seconds passed.

She began to pace the gym, not able to look him in the eye. 'You just don't understand. I used to be good enough but now I'm just, I'm just…' She struggled trying to find the right word. She had never been the most fluent, she was more of an "actions speak louder than words," type of person.

'I'm a mess!' She said finally. 'It's just that I have lost everything! I'm not me anymore. I'm not Rashel the vampire hunter, I'm just an incompetent idiot who can't even keep Zanshin for longer than a minute.' She sighed, trying to calm her seething mind. 'You just don't know… You don't know what it's like to lose who you are…'

He didn't reply at first but when he did, he spoke in a flat voice that made everything seem a hundred times worse.

'I know exactly what it's like to lose who you are.'

Suddenly she forgot everything that she had been angry about as she finally met his gaze, his eyes not empty anymore, not cold, just endlessly sad.

'John, I didn't mean'- But he cut her off with a bitter laugh.

'I lost my family, I lost dove and above all I lost my humanity. Life stripped me bare of everything I ever had and it chucked me back into the wild as a savage, cold, bloodrinking beast, which murdered hundreds of innocent people without a single shred of mercy. I became a monster Rashel, I am a monster right n'-

'Don't you dare! Don't you even dare, John Quinn! You are more human than anyone else I know so don't you even try to compare yourself to people like the Redferns,' Rashel yelled, grabbing his black shirt with a rock hard fist and shoving him backwards with pure force until his head hit the wall.

He looked at her stunned but she was too busy yelling to notice. 'I know exactly what you're like. I know you have nightmares about your past. I know that you're constantly terrified about becoming one of them but as your soulmate I'm making you listen to me when I say, that you are NOT a monster! John Quinn is the name of a human, you are human and you are John Quinn! So don't even try to pull that rubbish with me because I'm not letting you even think it, never mind say it!

He didn't take his blue eyes of hers, as she made sure he heard every word.

'Ok.' He said at last.

'Good. …And I'm sorry… for earlier…' Rashel replied, pulling away from him, but he stopped her by grabbing her wrists.

Kissing her lightly, he kept his arms around her and she didn't resist, letting that silver line between them grow.

'Thank you,' he said in an inaudible whisper before finally letting her go back to her training.

It was an hour later before she stopped, having broken the punching bag. As she went to her locker to get her clothes she knew that she had been wrong. John was the most important thing to her now, even more than being able to fight was, of course she was glad that she had met him.


End file.
